Michigan Education Association leader says union isn't standing in the way of Race to the Top money

Michigan Education Association leaders say they’re being unfairly painted as obstructing the state’s ability to compete for a slice of the billions of dollars that could be dispersed through the federal Race to the Top program.

Union President Iris Salters on Monday issued a three-page open letter to lawmakers and the public saying she wants the state to get it’s share of the money. But they’re not too happy about some of the program’s demanded reforms.

Depending on who is doing the estimating, Michigan schools could get between $300 million and $600 million, though some educators fear those totals will drop as the plan drags into the election year and money must be spread over more states.

Iris SaltersBefore states take the one-time payments, they must agree to accept a series of reforms, including expanding the number of charter schools and linking teacher evaluations to students performance — topics that have not thrilled the union in the past.

“Whether or not we get the money from Washington, these changes must make sense for our students and our schools in Michigan,” Salters writes.

The union goes on record as not opposing adding to the number of charters “with a proven track record of success, so long as greater accountability and transparency for charters accompanies that increase.” Presumably the union does not think such measures are in place at this time.

Salters writes that the union opposes using test scores as the sole basis of teacher evaluation, saying it would be “unfair, unethical, disingenuous and, most of all, contrary to the best interest of all students.”

She said the state needs to look at other data, including “tracking and linking other student information, such as attendance, homework completion, parental involvement, free- or reduced-price lunch status, other socioeconomic date, special education needs, English language proficiency, and other factors that have been proven to time and again influence student learning.”

Salters writes that the union has issues with merit pay, saying that when tied to student performance is “neither fair nor effective.” Such plans in the past have failed due to a lack of resources, she said, and fears the one-year nature of the Obama program will doom any new merit pay plans.

As for teacher tenure, Salters writes that the union has no interest in protecting bad teachers, but wants to preserve due process so a district must prove a teacher is ineffective before being dismissed.

She said “absolutely no changes to the basic tenure model are necessary,” but that the union is “willing to discuss” reforms that would help resolve tenure cases more quickly.

Finally, Salters said the union doesn’t see the need for alternative certification for teachers, “given the quality and quantity of education graduates in our state (not to mention the ranks of laid-off teachers looking for work).”

She said for the purposes of the Race to the Top application, the union is “willing to set aside that basic objection” as long as there are steps to ensure the alternative certification programs produce quality teachers.

Salters calls for those programs to have GPA requirements as high or higher than those in teacher prep programs.

Finally, the union backs the state House of Representatives plan for turning around failing schools, which teams educators with state-appointed “turnaround” experts, reserving the most severe sanctions for extreme cases.

MEA spokesman Doug Pratt said the goal of putting the letter out there was to put all the unions positions in one place for people to see, as well as the complexity of the issues.

“People need to see that these issues aren’t black and white, but a lot of gray,” he said. “The MEA isn’t standing in the way, as people have said. But we want these things to make sense even if we don’t get the money in the end.”